Dark Realities: What Can’t Be Said in Children’s Books
The PEN Children's Book Committee is a group of professionals who volunteer their time to advance children's literature and protect freedom of expression: the right of children's authors to… More
Omniscient Omnivore
Gertrude Stein was well aware of all of this. She was a scientist of language and of thought and music—harmony and melody—in an uncanny way. Words like omniscient and… More
Performance Art
Here’s a theory—or elements of a theory—of the comic. In this theory, the comic contains or embraces six elements. The first is the quality of deadpan, of impassivity; for… More
Being in Her
That’s what’s so wonderful when you immerse yourself in the tide of this novel. It’s somewhat like listening to a piece of music by Philip Glass or John Adams… More
Language Barriers
I met Beckett in the mid ’60s. I’d started to read him in the mid ’50s and I wanted to meet the man. I didn’t often want to meet… More
Deranged Punctilio
“I lay inert on the bed and it took three women to put on my trousers. They didn’t seem to take much interest in my private parts, which to… More
Pure Magic
I want to tell you the three most important theatrical events of my life. There have been many—my first Sophocles, my first Shakespeare, my first Molière, my first Uncle… More
Father of Choice
Life clung to Samuel Beckett, irritatingly, for eighty-three and three-quarter years. When he told me he’d lost his teeth, I mumbled an inanity: “It could be worse.” Without pause, he… More
Evenings in Paris
There were no more than twenty or thirty people in the audience. To my surprise, I loved Godot—how could you not? Dick was beaming. I guess this had been… More
Mel Gussow: Uproarious Pessimism
In the late 1940s, over a period of a little more than a year, Samuel Beckett wrote Molloy and Malone Dies, the first two parts of his trilogy of… More
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